Newsmaker of the week, U.S. Congress

Just hours before adjourning for a long holiday break, House Republicans caved to political pressure and popular opinion and agreed to a two-month extension of payroll tax cuts that will save the average American about $1,000 a year.

The House GOP for weeks has been stonewalling, refusing to budge on their position that they will oppose anything and everything President Barack Obama proposes, even a tax cut for a majority of Americans. During the holidays.

Thankfully, common sense prevailed and Congress was able to strike a deal, which also extends unemployment benefits averaging about $300 a week and prevents doctors from absorbing a big cut in Medicare payments.

If the cuts had expired as scheduled, 160 million workers would have seen a tax increase of $20 a week for an average worker earning about $50,000 a year. And up to 2 million people without jobs for six months would start losing unemployment benefits averaging $300 a week. Doctors would have seen a 27 percent cut in their Medicare payments, the product of an archaic 1997 cut that Congress has been unable to fix.

New York stood to lose about $7.1 billion in taxes, according to a study by state Comptroller Tom DiNapoli.